


Not Even Bound By Red Tape

by Idle_Hans



Series: AU is a Measure of Distance [4]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Canon Divergence, Gen, harry potter and the prisoner of azkaban - Freeform, world-building
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-23
Updated: 2020-06-23
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:21:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 750
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24872974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Idle_Hans/pseuds/Idle_Hans
Summary: Grand Sorcerer is an office conferred by royalty.One problem with spending a lifetime gathering all possible power into your own hands so that no-one else can misuse it, is that pretendingnotto have all this power becomes a long-established habit.Such habits can be hard to break.
Series: AU is a Measure of Distance [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1799656
Kudos: 25





	Not Even Bound By Red Tape

**Author's Note:**

> Albus Dumbledore's honours and offices other than Headmaster are listed on the Hogwarts letterhead thus:  
>  _"Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards"_
> 
> The standard method of listing titles and distinctions is in order of importance, and the famous parochialism of the English establishment can rule out the idea that wizards do it in ascending order. (Supreme Mugwump of an international body more important than Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot? What utter piffle.) Given that the Wizengamot is not only the legislature of magical Britain but also its judiciary, the position of Chief Warlock arguably confers much higher precedence than membership of the Order of Merlin. In which case, if there's any logic at all to the arrangement on the letterhead (though logic certainly can't be guaranteed given that wizards are involved), then what we're seeing are all of Dumbledore's honours, followed by all of his offices — apart from the Headmastery of Hogwarts, which appeared before his name.
> 
> 'Grand Sorcerer' is therefore either an honour of less importance than the Order of Merlin, or an office of greater importance than Chief Warlock.
> 
> I went with option two.
> 
> * * *

Everyone always remembers that Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore had the Order of Merlin and was Headmaster of Hogwarts and Chief Warlock of the British Wizengamot. The worldly minded could also tell you that he was Supreme Mugwump of the International Confederation of Wizards. Almost no-one ever remembered, except when they saw it on a letterhead, what was by far the most important of Dumbledore's titles.

The role of Grand Sorcerer was formalised in 1602 when it became clear that England would one day very soon be a possession of the witchcraft-hating King James VI of Scotland. It was, in effect, the rank of Royal Wizard inverted and magnified. Instead of tacitly representing magical England to the monarch, the Grand Sorcerer secretly represented the monarch to magical England. In short, a viceroy that the new king would not know he had.

The only significant alteration to the role came following the muggle Treaty of Union in 1707. The Grand Sorcerer's prevail now covered the entirety of the British Isles save the eternally and ferociously independent community of magical Ireland. For all practical purposes this expansion of the office's formal scope was simply a ratification of the _de facto status quo_ , as the Wizengamot and the Ministry of Magic had ruled all of magical Britain from London for nearly a century. 

Although by the late nineteen-hundreds convention had long since dictated that the office of Grand Sorcerer be almost purely ceremonial in its functions, and vestigial at that, nearly all the actual stripping away of the British monarch's powers by the non-magical houses of parliament had taken place _after_ the enactment of the Statute of Secrecy and the consequent separation of magical and non-magical law. Thus Her Majesty's wizarding viceroy retained on paper almost all the formidable powers of Queen Elizabeth the _First_.

Hermione Granger stumbled onto this aspect of Professor Dumbledore's many positions and duties during the summer of 1994. In her own way she was attempting to console herself over the execution of Sirius Black by going once again through all of her legal research from the previous year, in the hopes of satisfying herself that nothing more could have been done. Instead, she was horrified to realise that the Headmaster had, as Grand Sorcerer, possessed the authority to intervene at any point. He could have issued instant pardons for both wizard and hippogriff. He could have refused to allow dementors to leave Azkaban at all, let alone surround and invade the school grounds. He could have ordered Fudge to rescind the Kiss-on-Sight warrant for Sirius Black. He could have threatened to dismiss the Minister from office. Merlin, he could have _banished_ Fudge from Britain entirely!

Instead, Dumbledore never once dropped his chosen disguise as eccentric school administrator. All his mighty powers as Grand Sorcerer lay unused, dusty and dormant, even when she and Harry were protesting their knowledge of Sirius Black's innocence right to Dumbledore's face. All he did was hint that the two of them — two children — go back in time while he looked the other way. In desperation they did so. They succeeded in getting Buckbeak away from Macnair's axe, and Harry succeeded in casting a Patronus to keep their past selves and Sirius from being Kissed by a swarm of dementors on the shores of the lake; but in the same moment Hermione utterly failed to prevent Buckbeak taking fright, pulling free from her grasp, and flying away.

Their desperate attempt to save Sirius by means of brooms failed also, when they triggered an alert of some kind upon entering the Quidditch equipment rooms out of hours. They were captured by a triumphant Professor Snape who immediately immobilised them. While Snape was floating them back to the castle, Hermione and Harry could only lie still and listen as Sirius's final cries for mercy drifted down from the tower window.

Now Hermione was expelled from school and her wand snapped for 'violating with criminal intent' the conditions on which she was issued a Time-Turner, and for 'exerting a corrupting influence on a fine young wizard'. Those were Fudge's words, not Dumbledore's, but since the Headmaster had once again pretended to have no overriding power, not even in his own school, she could now never lawfully practise wanded magic in Great Britain. Her best option was migrating to Ireland or North America when she was eighteen and resuming private study.

But dear heaven, what was Harry going to do when she told him what she'd just discovered?

**Author's Note:**

> In the former British colony where I live, the Governor General (i.e. the Queen's viceroy) has the authority to dismiss the Prime Minister and their government, and the Prime Minister has the authority to 'advise' (i.e. demand) that the Governor General resign. On separate occasions both these things have happened. But if the Governor General digs their heels in, the Prime Minister can only refer the matter upstairs to Buckingham Palace. Convention dictates that the Queen would follow the Prime Minister's advice (although as far as I know this has never been tested), but there is a delay involved because of all the phonecalls. By contrast, the vice-regal power to dismiss the Prime Minister is almost instant in effect, and if the Governor General acted first then the Queen would be very, very unlikely to override it. 
> 
> Applying this as an analogy for the constitutional arrangements of magical Britain as a secret British colony on home soil:  
>  The position of 'Grand Sorcerer' as I have described it is of course a figment of my imagination. But unless the power-brokers of magical Britain were careless enough to set up the office of Minister for Magic as an indefinite dictatorship — and I remind you that in the fifty years leading up to the enactment of the Statute of Secrecy, no fewer than three British kings in a row had been kicked off the throne — there has to be someone holding reserve powers. In non-magical Britain that's the Queen. In magical Britain it's either the Queen directly, or someone with authority to act in her name. And if that's anyone mentioned in canon, it's either the Grand Sorcerer, or ... *drumroll* ... the _Chief Warlock_.
> 
> Public uproar would have been considerable, but Dumbledore could have gotten rid of Fudge while Fudge was still persuading the Wizengamot to get rid of Dumbledore. As a lesser measure the incumbent holder of the reserve powers in 1995–96 could also have 'referred back to the Wizengamot' (i.e. vetoed) any or all of Umbridge's Educational Decrees.
> 
> It all comes back to Dumbledore's ideas about what, and who, he was willing to sacrifice for his 'greater good'.


End file.
